This is a joint giveaway with Natural Parents Network and Code Name: Mama. You may enter at one site only. Please find the section marked “Win it!” for the mandatory main entry and optional bonus entries.

GREEN YOUR PERIOD special event: We are featuring a series of reusable menstrual products for review and giveaway. Go green, no matter what time of the month!

Lunapads International is a women-owned mission-based business based in Vancouver, Canada. Their mission is to help women have healthier and more positive experiences of their menstrual cycles, and by extension, their bodies overall. Their team is made up of a passionate group of women who believe that using natural menstrual products is a creative and empowering way to honor and care for ourselves and the planet.1

Why would switching to Lunapads benefit our planet? Think about this: the average woman can have 350 to 450 menstrual periods in her lifetime.2 Wow! That many periods means we go through a lot of tampons and/or pads. How many? Well, if you’re using disposable products, you could be using upwards of 17,000 tampons or pads throughout your lifetime.3

And every disposable tampon and pad ends up floating around our planet. One waste consultant estimated “that 6.5 billion tampons and 13.5 billion sanitary pads, plus their packaging, ended up in landfills or sewer systems in 1998. And according to the Center for Marine Conservation, over 170,000 tampon applicators were collected along U.S. coastal areas between 1998 and 1999.”4 Setting aside the issue of the toxic waste we create by disposing of our sanitary products, consider the environmental impact of the continuous production of disposable products – both the product and the packaging. Not only is there the pollution caused by the manufacturing process, but there is also the not-so-small matter of the toxins introduced into cotton during the growing process. “No less than 170 insecticides are registered for use on cotton crops[!]”5 One author predicts that if only one in twenty women chose to switch “to organic tampons, we could eliminate 750,000 pounds of pesticides annually.”6

Think how much waste we would save, how many pounds of pesticides we could eliminate, if women would only choose reusable products! Lunapads are now used by thousands of women in 40 countries: as a result, Lunapads is saving our landfills and shores from an estimated 1 million disposable pads and tampons every month.7

Reading these facts was the driving force behind my own decision to try reusable menstrual products soon after my son was born. I’ve been using menstrual cups (first the Diva Cup and now the Moon Cup) for almost two years now. In conjunction with my menstrual cups, I also use cloth pantyliners made by a local WAHM. And so I was excited when offered the chance to review Lunapads.

Lunapads Are Comfortable and Easy!

First of all, I cannot express how soft and cozy the Lunapads Organic Cotton Sampler Pack feels. They are incredible! The snaps are easy and functional – at one point I snapped the maxi pad one-handed. Below is my review of the maxi pad and the mini pantyliner.

1. Maxi Pad

I must admit, I was a bit confused about how I was supposed to use the maxi pad. As you can see in the video below, I wasn’t sure where the extra wings would go, I was concerned about the feel of the rickrack against my sensitive bits, and I was hesitant to go without my menstrual cup – I’ve simply not been a fan of big, bulky pads.

I was pleasantly surprised by the Lunapads maxi pad. It did not feel overly bulky – yes, I knew it was there, but it did not bother me the way disposable maxi pads do. Disposable maxi pads are itchy and uncomfortable, the Lunapads maxi pad was soft and conformed more to my body.

The rickrack never bothered me at any time – I never noticed that it felt any different than the rest of the soft, cozy inner liner. And the great thing about the liners? They enabled me to wear the maxi pad all day on one of the heavy flow days of my period. I just slipped one liner in for the first half of the day, and I replaced it with the second liner in the afternoon. When I was done with the first liner, I rinsed it out and put it in the same container that I store my used cloth wipes before washing them.

My minor complaints about the maxi pad: 1) The liner wings got in the way a little bit. At first I left them out in an effort to keep the main part of the pad clean. But they were getting messy, and so I tucked them under the liner itself. 2) The pad and liner did slip a bit during the day, but it easily went back into place when I used the restroom. I wonder if they could add snaps to those inner liner wings to help prevent slippage.

Regardless, wearing the maxi pad was a nice change from my cup. I might not be totally converted, but I will enjoy a break from my cup at least once or twice a cycle.

2. Mini Pantyliner

The mini pantyliner was much more my style. It was just the right size and thickness, and I didn’t notice it slipping around at all. If you aren’t a maxi pad kind of gal, I’d highly recommend these pantyliners – they are so comfortable and soft! By the way, if you use a menstrual cup or are curious about trying one, Lunapads also sells The DivaCup.

I talked a little bit more about my experience in my video review – check it out!

BUY IT!

You can find a wide variety of products and fabric choices on Lunapads.com, from the innovative Lunapanties – a hybrid of panties + Lunapads, to fun water-resistant travel pouches, for discretely carrying your Lunapads products while out and about.

And just for Natural Parents Network and Code Name: Mama readers, Lunapads is giving a 15% discount on all orders over $50 from now through June 30th, 2011. Enter code NPN11 during the ordering process.

WIN IT!

For your own chance to win a copy of the Lunapads Organic Cotton Sampler Pack, enter in the comments below! Contest is open to the U.S. and Canada only. (Our apologies, international readers!)

MAIN ENTRY:Visit Lunapads and sign up for their monthly newsletter (scroll about halfway down the page to find the sign-up box). The added bonus for you? When you sign up, you will save $5 on your order when you sign up ! Let us know you’ve signed up for the newsletter by leaving a comment below.

Leave a valid email address in your comments (the line where it says “email address”) so we can contact you if you win. Email addresses are not made publicly visible.

This is a joint giveaway between Code Name: Mama and Natural Parents Network.You may enter at one site only, and we’ll be recording IP addresses to ensure that there are no duplicate entries. That said, please do check out and enjoy both sites!

BONUS ENTRIES, to increase your chance of winning (leave a separate comment for each so we can count them all):

Check out one of Lunapads’ other products and tell us which one you like the most and why.

Share this giveaway with your friends on Facebook. You can use this text as a status update: Enter to win a Lunapads Organic Sampler Pack and help us divert over a million pounds of waste from our landfills. Via @Natural Parents Network and @Code Name: Mama! {3.12, US/Can} (Be sure to attach the post’s link to your update: http://codenamemama.com/2011/02/05/lunapads-giveaway)

Leave a relevant comment on a non-giveaway article at Natural Parents Network and tell us which post (comment on separate posts for up to 3 entries total).

Leave a relevant comment on a non-giveaway article at Code Name: Mama and tell us which post (comment on separate posts for up to 3 entries total).

Put the Natural Parents Network badge on your website or add http://NaturalParentsNetwork.com to your text blogroll for 2 extra entries each. The HTML code for the badge is on the front page of NaturalParentsNetwork.com. Leave your site URL in the comment.

RULES:

Contest open to United States and Canada street mailing addresses only.

Contestants may enter at either CodeNameMama.com or NaturalParentsNetwork.com, but not both. Entries will be combined for the drawing of a single winner.

Leave each entry as a separate comment so we can count them all.

For actions like following and subscribing, if you already follow or subscribe, just let us know in your comment.

For tasks that garner you multiple entries, you can copy and paste the comment with a #1, #2, etc.

You don’t have to do any of the bonus entries, but you do have to complete the first mandatory one.

We will pick the winner through Random.org after the contest closes and send an email notification. Leave a valid email address as you comment so we can contact you if you win. If we can’t reach a winner or don’t hear back within a couple days, we’ll draw a new name.

Disclosure: Our reviewer received the Organic Cotton Sampler Pack for review.
Amazon links are affiliate links.
We try to seek out only products we think you would find
relevant and useful to your life as a natural parent.
If we don’t like a product, we won’t be recommending it to you.
See our full disclosure policy here.

Get to know some of our fabulous NPN Volunteers!

Kat from Heart and Wisdom Birth is one of our wonderful volunteers. With lots of heart and a love of fun, Kat puts her loving and supportive personality to work as a doula and parent coach in New Brunswick, Canada. Be sure to look her up if you're nearby!

Megan from The Boho Mama is one of our fantastic authors. When she's not writing for NPN you can find her at her blog the Pacific Northwest, parenting twin girls, being AP and mama-hood in general. You'll also find her gorgeous handmade ring slings on Etsy - visit Boho Mama for the link!

Vidya from VidyaSury helps spread the word about NPN as one of our Social Media volunteers. When she's not stumbling our posts she's working from home as a freelance author / blogger. Being mother to a teenage son, learning languages and a sunny personality are all part of Vidya's life in Southern India. Stop by her blog(s) for smiles and inspiration!

Popular Posts

You've seen our recent posts, now read some of our most popular articles: